Harry Potter’s David Yates to Direct a Doctor Who Movie

The Doctor has been flying around time and space and various points of the universe in that newfangled police box of his, using his famous sonic screwdriver to solve every problem imaginable for the last gazillion decades or so, but he’s never really had what you would call a signature movie chronicling his adventures. That might change now with “Harry Potter’s” David Yates collaborating with the blokes at the BBC on a new, original “Doctor Who” movie.

Yates and the BBC’s Jane Tranter are currently looking for writers on both sides of the Atlantic to bring their version of the good Doctor to the big screen. And for those who are afraid the movie version might somehow get all mixed up with the current, highly lucrative TV series, they needn’t be afraid. This, says Yates, will be a completely new Doctor Who. Yes, they’re essentially starting from scratch with a whole new character who happens to also be called “The Doctor”.

“Russell T. Davies and then Steven Moffat have done their own transformations, which were fantastic, but we have to put that aside and start from scratch,” [Yates] said.

There have been two “Doctor Who” movies in the past, “Doctor Who and the Daleks” in 1965 and “Doctor Who: Daleks’ Invasion Earth 2150 A.D.” in 1966. Both film starred Peter Cushing as the time-traveling alien-humanoid Time Lord. There was also that Fox-backed Doctor Who TV movie that was supposed to launch a new Doctor Who series co-starring Eric Roberts, but that never really took off.

The current “Doctor Who” TV show is running on the BBC and BBC America, and stars Matt Smith as the genius alien in human form and Scottish lass Karen Gillan as his human traveling companion.